...ever ever ever get over this sweet face.
not in one million years.
not ever.
she is so sweet.
so perfect in our eyes. and the greatest blessing.
she is ours to love and protect.
i listened to a little bit of a
john macarthur podcast
(cousin sent it via e-mail) the other day.
god's pattern for parents. pulled from ephesians 6.
Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. Ephesians 6:4
What is parenting? Very simple, really, loving your children so that they're not angry with you and bringing them up to know the Lord.
simple enough. right?
In spite of the simplicity of the instruction, parents today appear to me to be somewhat frightened about the whole prospect. They are challenged by the times in which we live, the issues at hand. And some of them look at parenting as a frightening responsibility.
parenting is so scary. ultimately, as elle's momma, i just don't want to screw her up. my prayer is that she grows to be a passionate, confident, caring, kind, loving woman. one who loves JESUS more intimately than i can even imagine. i pray that her light shines so bright that people are drawn to her. and, through her many will see and know Christ.
i know, that all i can do is pray for my sweet girl. daily. hourly. sometimes i am overwhelmed by parenthood. it is a HUGE responsibility. one we cannot do alone.
Life is frankly no longer simple. It is no longer centered in the home. It is no longer centered in the family as a close-knit and only marginally influenced unit, that is influenced from the outside world. That's not true anymore. There was a time when that was true. There was a time when you grew up on a farm and you basically lived your whole life there. You ate breakfast with the family, you probably went to a little school down the road and went to school with all your neighbors and were taught by a teacher or two from the local area. You went back home, worked on the farm, sat around the house at night and basically were instructed in life by that family relationship. And that home would be only marginally influenced from the outside world. And that basically has been true for a long, long time.
heard that and longed for that simple life.
Let me tell you why he believes and others believe that childhood is disappearing and what are the manifestations of it. First of all, clothing used to be different for children. Now it is as much like adults as possible. And while that isn't the issue itself, that is reflective of the issue. Children now demand to be dressed as closely to the dress of their parents as they possibly can be.
And then there's behavior and language and attitudes and desires and all of these things now are basically indistinguishable between children and adults. Children don't talk like children, they talk like adults. Their attitudes are adultlike. Their vocabulary is adultlike. Many today are now crying for equal rights for children, because they're nothing other than short and light adults.
What does that produce? It produces an uncontrollably overexposed population of children...overexposed to everything without regard for any plan or any sequence. All of a sudden in your home, your children are no longer only able to know what you tell them and what your teacher tells them, they can turn on the television and be blitzed with any information about anything at any time at any level. Computers now and InterNet personalize the world's best and the world's worst for anybody who can access it. And the whole educational sequence, the whole educational hierarchy has collapsed under the weight of video.
So they're overexposed to things their minds and emotions cannot handle.
in her lifetime, elle louise will be influenced by so many people other than her family, church and teachers. and there is nothing i can do about it,
unless we keep her locked in her bedroom. then she'll just grow up to be a weirdo.
aaron and i often talk about how we want to raise elle louise
(and future children)...how we can help to build
humility and character in her without crushing her
sweet spirit. it's not black and white.
oh. how i wish it was.
So what's the answer? Back to Ephesians 6. The answer, "Fathers," speaking for both really, father and mother, "do not provoke your children to anger, which these things do, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord."
In other words, you just constantly are teaching them the truth about God and about judgment and about grace and forgiveness and salvation...when you stand up, sit down, lie down, walk in the way. Thorough...you don't have to be confusing and complex, but you don't want to be too simplistic, either.
there is so much more to this sermon.
some that i don't necessarily agree with, but for the most part it was a good thing for me, as a parent, to hear and read.
so, if you get a moment, go
{here} to read the sermon or
{here} to listen to it. the audio is a little over an hour.
p.s. it hailed crazy balls today. while on my way to pick up elle louise at kdo it started dumping. nothing i could do but just keep driving.
terrifying!
